God, thank you so much for giving us yourself.
God, we love you so much.
We long to love you and to know you and to walk with you even more intimately and fully and wholly in every part of our lives.
Lord, as we open your word and seek to listen to what you're saying,
there's so many competing messages.
There's so much noise in our lives.
In my life.
Lord, would you silence the noise?
Would you remove the distractions, whether it's just the busyness of life, the stresses, or even if there's just spiritual stuff going on?
Would you just silence the distractions and help us to hear your word?
Lord, as I speak, would you give us discernment to reject the stuff that is just me?
But would you also give us the humility and the help by your Holy Spirit to embrace all that is true from you?
Lord, would you shine through these heavy words we're going to hear today?
As we deal with difficult subjects, would you, in your kindness and your love and your mercy, minister to us, your people.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
have some Bibles you can borrow right over here. I also want to say a really big thank you to Neil
Stevens, who has joined our church as a pastor, joined the pastoral team. He served as a senior
pastor, I think several different churches over the years, and it's such a gift to all of us to
have him here at the church, to help lead the services, as well as to minister to our congregation
and congregational care, and in so many different ways. I was just so ministered to him at the eight
o'clock, ministered by him. He ministered to me at the eight o'clock service in such a precious way.
I just am so blessed to get to work with you today and in the future. So if you have Bibles, Amos chapter
two, we're going to be, the text that was read earlier, it was verses four through 16, and today
we're going to be focusing on verses six through 16. Last week we began our summer series through Amos.
George began his message with a video clip of Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous I Have a
Dream speech, and I've loved that speech since my parents showed it to me when I was a little boy,
and whenever I see that speech, and it's got the famous passage from Amos where Martin Luther
King Jr. is so epically in his voice that I can't even imitate, said, let justice roll down from the
mounds, and it's just, it's awesome. A lot of us were there last week, and we watched it. From when I was a
boy to this day, when I see that, like I'm hearing it, I'm seeing it as if I'm one of the people there,
as if I'm part of his movement, as if I would have been alive at that time, I'm sure I would have
not forgotten to renew my passport like I did this past month, and I would have been there. I would
have crossed the border. I'd be standing with him, standing for freedom. We often think of ourselves
as being those champions. Now, in Amos, in the passage that George is dealing with last week,
Amos is, he's speaking these words about 800 years before Jesus, around 800 BC, and he's a member of
the northern kingdom. At this point, Israel had been divided into the northern kingdom of Israel and
Judah. Judah was where Jerusalem and the temple was, and those two, they were all the people of Israel,
the kingdom of Israel and the kingdom of Judah, but they were at war with each other. They were enemies
at this point. And in the opening words to this book of Amos last week, George, the part he preached
on, there are these different pronouncements of judgment to the various countries surrounding
Israel and Judah. Some of them were their historic enemies. These were people who'd been a thorn in the
side of the people of Israel for centuries. And so if you were the people of Israel and Amos is speaking
to you, prophesying the judgment, you'd be so stoked. And that's not even a bad thing. Like, if God
all of a sudden sent a prophet into this room and he prophesied that God was going to, God had heard
the cries of the victims of ISIS, of the Yazidis and the Christians and the various, like, Muslim
minorities there, and that he was going to crush ISIS, I think that a lot of us would be like, God,
thank you so much. And that's how the people of Israel were responding to this. They're hearing
these enemies, those enemies. And then God also speaks of the contemporary enemies, the ones who
they were at war with right then. And you're like, yes, do your thing, smash them. This is justice.
And then in the passage we looked at today, we're looking at today, God then turns his attention to
the kingdom of Judah. And even though a lot of these would be, like, family members of the people in the
north, these two Jewish kingdoms are at war with each other. So again, you'd actually be hearing, like,
yes, that is awesome. And then Amos, God through Amos, turns his attention to the northern kingdom,
the one who Amos is prophesying to. And he says, you are just as evil, you are just as unjust,
and judgment is coming on you if you don't turn, if you don't repent. And as I've been pouring over
this chapter two, what we're looking at here, what we see in this passage is that the people of
Israel had become so complacent, they'd become so confident in their being the people of God,
that they couldn't see the wickedness and the perversion and the injustice that they had become
complacent to or even active contributors to in their lives. At the time, it was much like today,
where the northern kingdom of Israel, these are God's people, and the middle class was doing very
well. They were very involved in spiritual activity. It was very comfortable. And they were very
confident that they were just blessed because they're God's people, and they were taking it for
granted. And now it's just a surprise punch to the face as God has just been, like, pronouncing
judgment to all their enemies, and they're so stoked. And God says, you're just as unjust. And so as we go
through this today, it's going to be heavy, but we're going to look at four different categories of sins,
of transgressions, of these things that are of injustice that God is addressing in the kingdom
of Israel, and that I believe he is still speaking to us today. So the first one you see in verse 6,
because they sell the righteous for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals,
those who trample the head of the poor into the dust of the earth and turn aside the way of the
afflicted. So the first thing that Amos is addressing is this exploitation of the poor.
Quite literally, the buying and the selling of human beings as if they're things. A trampling on
the poor. And so I've been actively praying. I know there's so many different avenues that we can
explore in this, but what are some ways that we, as the people of God today, might be like the people
of Israel then and are doing this? Well, one would be the issue of human trafficking, quite literally,
the buying and selling of people. There are more than 27 million victims of human trafficking today.
And what does that victimization look like? Well, in some cases, it's prostitution. In others,
it's the development of products that you and I enjoy. It's the development of products that you
and I, as I know we're various demographics here, I'd definitely be on the, I'm not, for me to be able
to buy good products, they have to be cheap. Let's just say that. So this morning, this morning,
as part of my morning routine, I shaved my face. The shaving cream I use, it's the stuff that I can
afford at Loblaws. It does the job, I think. Well, that stuff, just like the shaving cream
that probably almost anyone else here uses, guy or girl, is most likely made by victims of human
trafficking. That's not controversial and not some crazy act. That's just the case. Look it up. You
can Google it. I don't even mind if you Google it right now. You can verify the facts, multitasking.
A lot of the bathroom products we use are made by victims of human trafficking, and that's why
they're affordable for us to buy. A couple years ago, I turned my attention to trying to make sure
I wasn't contributing to this stuff, and I was a student, and I just felt like I couldn't afford
this stuff, the free-made stuff, and I went back to buying the products that you most likely are
buying. And this is true for some of our clothing items. It's true for some of the coffee we drink.
You and I are living the comfortable life we're living partly on the backs of victims of human
trafficking, on the buying and selling of people. Now, how do we make sure that we're not, by our
purchases, giving money to people perpetuating human trafficking? That's not something, just as
I was preparing this week, I thought maybe I can just toss my shaving cream and grab another one.
I didn't want to do a token. I didn't want to do tokenism. I want to take the time in my life,
and I hope that we as a community can actually talk about this stuff amongst ourselves, even over
coffee today. Like, it doesn't just have to be talking about how the Blue Jays are doing and how
we're sad that their winning streak descended. Why don't we talk about this stuff? How can we actually
go and explore how we cannot be contributing to human trafficking? This is what Amos is calling us
to do, that we would not be benefiting and participating in the selling of the righteous for
silver and the needy for a pair of sandals. But he's not just talking about human trafficking. He's also
talking about the exploitation of the poor, marginalizing these people, and all this type of stuff.
And in light of our, we're going to be showing the Martin Luther King Jr. clip a number of times
throughout the summer. And in light of that, I think it's important for us to ask the question,
are we, is racism a still present issue today? Is it part of our lives? I don't know about your life,
but I have been at these pastor meetings, legit, I've been at these pastor meetings where we have
people from various ethnicities there, and every single pastor who prays or is invited to do a
devotional, our pastors who, like me, are white. And that we have pastors from Nigeria and from the
Congo, and we have African Canadians and all sorts of people who aren't invited to speak. Now, there
might be a number of variety of reasons for that. Perhaps it's just statistically, it's just a
statistical anomaly that it just happened to be all of us who are white. But at least I should be
asking the question, at least we should be asking the question, why is it that it was all the white
pastors who were the ones who spoke? I know almost nothing. I'm a child. I'm honored to get to preach
to you, but why am I invited to speak at these things? And you have these incredible Congolese
pastors in the city who are doing incredible work, and they're not being asked to speak at these
things. Is it racism? I actually don't know. But this week, as I was pouring over Amos, I began to
ask that question. And so I called up a friend of mine, an African Canadian. I called her up. I'm like,
hey, I don't even know how to talk about this. Like, I'm not an expert on this. I don't even
really know, is the term African Canadian the right term to use? Is that offensive? But I was like,
hey, have you experienced racism in this city? And she was telling me stories that she's had to put
up with in high school and university and even in job interviews. And so we were chatting about it. I
said, hey, I'm going to be preaching on Amos. And how can our church begin to kind of try to address
this stuff? And so we talked about it, and we talked about whether or not I should, you know, ask her or
someone else, someone from a congregation, maybe as part of this sermon to share like three minutes
of their experience of dealing with race issues in Canada. I'm not talking about with Donald Trump.
I'm talking about Canada. And we talked about it. I said, you know what? This is my fear, and this is
why I will not ask you to come speak three minutes as part of the sermon. Because I think that if,
I don't know about you, if I had her come and share three minutes of this, then I would feel like,
hey, Church of the Messiah, we just made space for a marginalized voice. We just, we got to hear,
and like, we're a church with a difference. We gave three minutes to hearing about the reality of
racism in Ottawa. And then we could just move on with our lives. I don't want tokenism. I don't think
God wants tokenism. I actually think he hates it. God wants us to change. God wants his church,
his people. You see it right here. Why are you trampling the head of the poor? God wants us to
actually change and do something about this. The issues that she has as a black Canadians had to
face, it's not just like little, like she's facing legit, legit like marginalization, like legit like
abuse, racism in the city. But as you explore, what does it look like in Canada? Like we see it
every day in the news these days about America. But what does it look like in Canada? I don't have
answers. And that's okay because we as a church, I think if we're going to make a difference together,
I think we should look for the answers. So, but one of the areas we need to look at is the reality
of First Nations Canadians. Like one of my sisters was serving on the west coast of Vancouver Island,
the First Nations Reserve, and the suicide rate was in the high 80s for teens. Almost all their teens
are committing suicide. It's almost 100%. Some friends in the neighborhood I've been living in,
they're from a reserve in Canada, in Ontario, where the sexual abuse rate for the kids is almost 100%
of them are victims of sexual abuse. Where they don't have access to clean drinking water in Canada.
We're going overseas, we're going to Mexico, and we're doing these cool missions trips where we like
paint an orphanage building or something. But in our own country, we have third world conditions.
Now, why is that? Is that just as simple as racism? Is it because that maybe there are some in,
even in the First Nations governance structures that are actually where there's some corruption?
There's corruption in governments. I'm sure there is. There's all sorts of explanations. But I think we
need to at least be asking the question, is our complacency part of it? Are we, even if it's because
of corruption, not because of racism? Even if it's, well, let us as a people, let us as God's people
in Canada, get on our knees and pray, God, we're not satisfied with the whole demographic of Canada
being so broken and marginalized and truly like such poverty. It should embrace God's heart. We know that.
Let it break our hearts. Let it break our hearts. There's so many different avenues which we can
explore for the reality of the poor being crushed in Canada. But the last one I want to mention before
we move on, that is an issue, is a reality in every single church in Canada, in all of our communities,
in all of our friend groups, and most likely in all of our families, is that of abortion.
You know that 90% of children with Down syndrome are aborted in Canada. When I was a boy in Sunday
school, like every Sunday school class, whatever church, my family moved around the country a bunch,
went to different churches, and in every class, there'd be a child with Down syndrome.
They were such a delight. They were like, they're always my best friend. It was just so sweet.
My little siblings who are in Sunday school right now don't have friends with Down syndrome.
Not because there are no babies with Down syndrome in Canada, but because 90% are aborted.
Now, I discovered that not by heading off to the marches at Parma Hill, but I used to volunteer
at a crisis pregnancy center in Ottawa. And there I got to see, I got to work with, it was such a
privilege to work with some of these women who had abortions for very real, for very rough,
for very meaningful reasons. Very, like, it wasn't, it wasn't for very real reasons.
How, how, how did these women not find locally, in our city, the help they needed, or the truth
they needed, or the, the friends they needed, in order to be in a place where they wouldn't
feel pressured to make that decision? Were they given the resources? Were they given the truth?
Like, they're, they're being taught in school that, that a pre-born baby is just, just a blob
of tissue. Were they being, was anyone, was anyone standing up for the, for the innocent
lives, for the innocent blood that was shed? Tell them the truth of the science of the matter,
that a pre-born baby is not a human, is not a potential human being, but a human being with
great potential. Was anyone telling them that abortion is the decapitation, dismemberment,
and disembowelment of a living human being? Was anyone sharing the truth? Was anyone coming
alongside of them? Was this Christ's Parenthood Center was? And it was my privilege to get
to work with them. But through working with them, I saw, this is, this is not just something
happening in some other person's community. It's in our churches, it's in our families,
and we need to be there both to embrace those who've been harmed by abortion, who've, who have
given up their children to abortion, and also to do all that we can to stand for the 100,000
babies who are aborted every single year. 100,000 babies killed every single year in our country.
And so many of those who are giving their children up to abortion, they're not doing it because of,
of, of, like, of, of, of, like, of hatred, or, like, they, not even because they think they're,
they're okay with killing. No, they've been sold lies. And we have the truth. We should speak it.
We should speak it out. We should shout it from the rooftops with love, with kindness,
and with compassion. But we must not be silent. We mustn't be silent. Proverbs 24, verse 11 says,
Rescue those who are being taken away to death. Hold back those who are stumbling to the slaughter.
If you say, behold, we didn't know this. We didn't know they were stumbling to the slaughter.
Does not he who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not he who keeps watch over your soul know it?
And will he not repay man according to his work? Right here, God is not saying,
simply, make sure that you're not leading those innocent lives to the slaughter. He's saying,
rescue those who are being led to the slaughter. Hold them back who are being destroyed.
He's saying, I care about them so much. And, and you are, as my people, to be joining me in what I'm doing,
that you are required to go help rescue them. Are you and I rescuing the innocent in Canada? Are we part of that?
A great place to start, if you don't know how to be part of that, is, is, is start by just being an intercessor.
Take time every day. When I was, when I was a little kid, before going to that Christ's Prensing Center,
my sister and I, we just started praying. We were little kids, just praying every night before our bedtime.
Just praying, God, please, please come alongside those women who are in a tough situation, situation right now.
We're thinking of abortion and help them choose to keep their child. And Lord, please remember the silent screams of these babies.
Please come through for them. Bless those organizations. We're just little kids praying.
The Bible says many, in Proverbs 28, many men seek the face of the ruler, but from the Lord comes justice.
And so as we look to God in prayer, we are, we're doing battle. We're helping rescue. We are.
And then I also recommend, get involved by volunteering or by giving money to those organizations,
whether it's regarding the First Nations or whether it's regarding human trafficking or it's about abortion.
Let us be those who are rescuing those who are being led to the slaughter,
rescuing those who are being trampled on, who rescue those and giving, making space to give voice to those who are being marginalized.
This isn't like icing on the cake of Christianity.
This is what it means to be living life with Jesus, to be a follower and a believer of him.
That's the first category he's talking about, to stand up for justice.
And then he turns his attention to this.
A man, in verse 7, a man and a father go into the same girl, so that my holy name is profaned.
Like, Amos is speaking to the people of Israel, God's chosen people, saying,
you are being sexually immoral and you need to stop.
Are we being sexually immoral? That's a question worth asking.
Statistics show us about 90% of guys in Canada, and the same numbers are true outside of the church and inside the church,
are looking at pornography.
About 30% of women today are looking at pornography.
That's lust. Jesus said lust. It's committing adultery.
Yeah, we're being sexually immoral.
It gets even more intense than that.
A third of girls and one sixth of boys are sexually abused by their 18th birthday.
Sexual abuse is massively rampant in Canada.
It's true outside of the church and it's true within the church.
I guarantee you, we have more than three girls here, we have more than six guys here.
Some of us, girls and guys, have been sexually abused, for sure, within our church.
And 95% of sexual abusers are either the family or friends or trusted people to that person who was abused.
They're the one who abused it.
Which means if in every church we have been sexually abused,
then in many churches and many communities, there are those who have or are doing sexual abuse.
We're broken people.
And in case for a moment you're just like, oh yeah, that must be true in the other person's...
So much of the best academic research today regarding pornography and sexual abuse
shows that so much of this mainstream porn is filmed sexual abuse.
88% of mainstream porn contains physical aggression.
And 49% contain verbal aggression.
Now, physical aggression, sexual physical aggression is a crime.
And when that stuff is filmed, that's not people acting out crime.
That's people committing crime.
And so porn, if you're watching porn, you're actually watching the evidence of a crime scene.
If you're watching porn, you are actually, by those websites getting those hits,
by them getting more views, the people running that stuff are getting more money.
So that means if you're watching porn, you're actually giving money to,
that you might not be giving your money to,
but you're ensuring that they're getting money from the advertising,
these organizations that are filming people being sexually abused and uploading it to the internet.
This should not be the case.
What is one of the most practical ways we can fight for justice,
that we can fight against sexual abuse in Canada?
By becoming free of porn and by helping those around us become free of pornography.
And in case you think, oh, maybe you talk about this,
you and George talk about it too much from the front,
when it's 90% of guys and 30% of girls,
this is something affecting every one of our lives.
And even as it's so addictive and itself is an enslavement,
he who the sun sets free is free indeed.
And there truly is power to find freedom in the gospel,
not in isolation, but in community.
And so I want to invite you, if you are a girl or a guy struggling with porn,
come talk to George, come talk to Shirley, come talk to me,
and we would love to help you find freedom.
He who the sun sets free is free indeed.
The third thing that God through Amos addresses
is that the people are making,
the people are drinking wine lying down by the altars,
by where they worship God,
and they're doing it, they're treating it profanely.
They're treating God with profanity.
And when we think of someone speaking profanity,
we tend to think of someone like cussing a bunch,
or maybe taking God's name in vain.
Maybe they're saying like, oh my God,
but they're not saying a prayer.
But that's not actually what the word profanity means.
The Hebrew word for profanity,
which I don't actually know how to pronounce,
it means to treat as common.
God is saying that he's ready to pour out
his judgment upon his own people
because they're treating God as if he's just common.
How do you and I do that?
Well, let me count the ways.
There are so many different ways,
and we're not gonna count them.
But when you and I are at work,
when you and I are at school,
we're at work with our family or friends,
and there is a moral decision to make,
or there's a risk to take,
or even when there's that tug in your heart
to go share the gospel with someone,
or there is something to take a risk,
or maybe you just lied to your colleague
and all of a sudden you're like,
oh, I shouldn't have done that.
And you have that,
and you really know,
you gotta apologize for it,
or whatever it is that you know
that God's not just asking,
but really requiring us to do,
and inviting us to do,
and all of that.
And you and I are just like,
mm, not gonna do.
Not gonna do.
You and I are acting as if God
isn't actually God.
We're acting as if God isn't actually
the one who has all power,
and is able to come through for us,
and be there for us,
and strengthen us,
and help us to do the right thing.
And you and I are just treating him
as if he's just a bro.
We're treating him as if he's common.
When you and I instead actually
take that step of faith,
and step out to evangelize,
just like we know he's calling us to do,
or where you and I choose to take
the step of faith and apologize,
or we have lied to someone,
or where you and I quit that job
in order to do the thing God's calling us to.
When you and I live a life
that's treating God as if God really is God,
because he is,
we're not treating him as profane,
as common anymore.
We're treating him as if he is who he really is.
And so this past week,
I've just been asking,
God, show me, search me,
and show me how am I treating you
as if you're just another, eh.
How am I treating you as if you're just common?
Help me to live my life as worship,
live my life in light of who you really are,
in every part of my life.
And then when you jump down,
and in verse 14 he says,
but you made the Nazarites drink wine,
the command of the prophets saying,
you shall not prophesy.
The Nazarites are not those from Nazarene,
rather the Nazarites were these people
who would make this promise
of the commitment to God,
they'd make a vow to not cut their hair,
to not drink wine,
a few different things like that.
And we're Anglicans,
we drink wine,
we don't make promises not to,
generally speaking,
and I see a lot of us cut our hair,
so we're not making that vow.
I don't think a lot of us
are breaking the Nazarite vow.
So we've been asking God,
God, show me,
show our church,
in your kindness,
show us,
what are vows that we're making,
that we're not following through on,
that we're breaking?
I think one obvious answer is,
is our marriage vows.
You know,
the divorce right outside,
inside the church
is something like 30%,
one third of us.
We're making these vows
in the presence of God,
and then we're breaking them.
And God is saying,
okay,
everyone around you is doing this,
you are my people,
you are not to do this.
You're to be faithful.
What other vows do we make?
Well,
our baptism and confirmation,
we're saying,
God,
I am yours.
I don't know about you,
I've broken that vow.
We're saying,
God,
I'm going to live for you,
I've broken that vow.
And God is saying,
don't break these vows
you've made to me
of commitment.
Don't break these vows
that you've surrendered,
like the Nazarites,
surrendered your life to me.
I'm going to live life,
not for myself anymore,
but for God
and in his life.
And he's saying,
you're breaking your vow.
Return to me.
In the midst of all this stuff,
God,
it just kind of interrupts himself
in a sense.
And in verse nine,
yet it was I
who destroyed the Amorite
before them,
whose height was like
the height of the cedars.
God's saying,
look,
in the midst of all this,
God kind of interrupts himself
and says,
I delivered you guys.
I brought you
into the land of Israel.
I delivered you
from your enemies.
And they were giants.
And in saying this,
he's saying like,
you,
you think you guys
delivered that?
You think you delivered yourselves?
No,
I did this for you.
Sorry,
I can't help you hear that,
but say that without hearing
Julian Smith's voice in my head.
You know,
but I did this for you.
I made this for you.
And,
and he,
there's,
there's such power
in our returning our attention
to that
and remembering that.
First,
there's a sense
in which God's saying,
these guys were huge.
These guys were strong.
And these guys
treated me with profanity.
They,
they destroyed the innocent.
They trampled the poor.
Uh,
they,
they were not being faithful.
I drove them out.
They were mighty.
You guys
are not giants.
You got,
I can do the same to you.
But I think it's more than that.
I think God is reminding them,
look,
look at who,
look at who you're walking away from.
Look at who you're walking away from.
I'm the deliverer.
I'm the liberator.
I'm the freedom fighter.
I am your champion.
And you guys are just settling
for something so much less.
Why are you settling?
I made you for,
I made you for justice.
I made you for faithfulness.
I made you for purity.
And yet,
and,
and look,
I am,
like,
I'm the one that did this for you.
And you're just,
you're treating me as if I'm common.
And God isn't taking,
like,
as some personal slight,
like,
oh,
why,
why don't you love me?
No.
God cares about them so deeply.
And he wants them to be living this life
in the fullness of the justice
and the purity
and the wholeness
that he made them for.
Not only that,
but God cares so much
about the broken
and the marginalized
and the forgotten.
He's saying,
guys,
join me in caring for them.
And I believe that God
is interrupting himself
in the midst of this
to share this,
saying,
look,
remember,
turn to me.
He's saying,
I'm going to pour out judgment on you
just like I did the people
that I drove out for you.
But,
remember me,
turn to me.
We're so like
the people of Israel,
perhaps in some ways
even more broken.
You know,
the people of Israel
began to copy
their neighboring nations
in the practice
of trying to worship God
by offering child sacrifice.
They would take
their beloved children
and put them
on a stone,
like,
idol thing
that would have arms like this
and they'd light a fire
and they would kill their children
through burning it.
And growing up,
when I came across that,
I always thought they were doing that
to, like,
Moloch
and all these,
the pagan gods,
but they actually started doing it
as worship to Yahweh,
to God.
And in Ezekiel,
God says,
the thought that you would do that
never even entered my mind.
Which,
for an omniscient God,
a God who knows all things,
that's a trippy thought,
it never even entered his mind,
but he knows all things.
It's so horrendous.
But listen,
these people
offered up their children
as sacrifice.
They killed their children
because they believed
it was the most precious
thing they could give God.
It's twisted
to think that God
would want that,
but they're like,
what?
In their brokenness,
they're like,
this is the most precious thing
we can give.
And so they were killing
about a quarter of their children.
In Canada,
and in the church,
we're killing a quarter
of our babies,
not because we think
they're the most precious thing
we can give God,
but because we think
they're worthless.
We're not that different,
but maybe even more broken.
But just as God spoke
to the people of Israel,
his people,
saying,
please,
turn to me,
your freedom fighter,
your liberator,
the one who delivered you.
So I believe he speaks
to the church today.
If we will but listen,
if we will but silence
all the noise
and the competing messages
and the ones that don't care
about that,
and listen to his voice,
not my voice,
but listen to his call
to join him
in fighting for justice,
to truly be like
a Martin Luther King Jr.
who's saying,
let justice roll down.
A man who,
he had a great career
and good education
and this past week
is just reading his letters
from the Birmingham jail.
People who would be willing
to go to jail
because we're standing
with the innocent.
People who would be willing
to shut up
in order to let
the marginalized voices
actually,
not tokenism,
actually have a voice.
How do we do that?
I honestly don't know,
but I'm hoping
that we as a church
can actually change,
that we as a church
can actually figure
this stuff together
in the coming weeks
through prayer
and through conversations
and through searching
out the word
and through listening
to those who are marginalized.
Generally,
when a pastor
like this is preached,
we hear it,
we hear how heavy it is,
and then the pastor,
the preacher says,
but the gospel,
and then we're like,
yes,
thank you God,
we're forgiven,
and then we can go
and have communion
and then go
and eat some coffee
and have some,
drink some coffee
and have some cookies
and go from here
feeling good.
But that's a broken,
shallow,
perverted version
of the gospel.
It is.
Absolutely.
It's like Corinthians 3.18
says,
he who knew no sin,
he who knew no profanity,
he who knew no sexual abuse,
sexual abusing,
he who knew no trampling
on the poor,
he who knew no sin
became sin,
that we might become
the righteousness of God,
that he who knew no porn
became porn,
that we might become
the righteousness of God,
that he who knew no injustice,
it became unjust,
that we might become
the righteousness of God.
Jesus died,
absolutely,
to forgive us our sins
and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness.
Absolutely.
But that's just
the very beginning of it.
In the Old Testament,
they would offer,
they were supposed to do
sacrifices of their cows,
their bulls,
their lambs,
that kind of stuff,
as worship to God.
It's a sign that they
belonged to him.
They were part of his mission.
Then in the New Testament,
with Jesus dying,
coming back to life,
in Romans 12.1,
it says that,
in view of the mercy of God,
in view of the gospel,
in view of his forgiveness,
offer your body
as a living sacrifice.
We so often treat it
like in the Old Testament,
God required cows and bulls.
In the New Testament,
he just requires them,
sorry.
But it's absolutely true
that because of the cross,
we're freed from that,
that never successful,
never ending pursuit
of trying to earn God's pleasure
and trying to get right with him
by our own doing
and our own achieving.
We're freed from that.
Praise him.
But then,
that doesn't mean
that we just then go just chill
and just pursue
our own comfort.
No,
in light of him
freeing us from our shame
and our guilt,
in light of him
making us alive in him,
then we have the freedom
not to try to earn his pleasure
because he gives us his pleasure
and his favor
and his blessing.
In view of all of that,
he then says,
now,
not offer,
not just your cows,
give your very bodies to me
as a holy and living sacrifice.
Not just the absence of sin,
but the fullness of life in him,
a life of justice
and a life of purity
and a life of helping bring healing
to the broken heart
and helping bring the gospel
to those who don't have it
to join him in that glorious adventure
of the Christian walk,
of the walk with Jesus.
And so I think that I would be harming you
if I was to preach these words
and then say,
because of the gospel,
let's just go.
But rather to say,
because of the gospel,
through the power
that raised Jesus from the dead
that is at work within us,
we can change.
Have you sexually abused someone?
Well, you can find the courage in Jesus
to come and talk with me about it.
And we'll go to the police together.
Have you been sexually abused and hurt?
It's not that you've done something wrong to someone,
but someone's done something wrong to you.
There's healing in the blood of Jesus.
I'd love to explore that with you.
Are you contributing?
Am I contributing to human trafficking?
I am,
by my very own shaving of my face.
Can we come up with creative solutions
to how to still be clean shaven
but not be perpetuating human trafficking?
Absolutely.
And this isn't icing on the cake.
This is some of the meat
of what it means to be a Christian,
that we're following Jesus.
Five times in the gospels,
Jesus calls us to believe in him,
but more than 20 times,
he calls us to follow him.
To be a Christian is to follow Jesus.
And we don't find the strength to do that
by promising ourselves that we'll do better.
We don't find the strength to do that
by just trying to try harder,
but we do that as we open up our hearts
afresh to the gospel.
As we eat the bread and receive the wine,
we're both receiving his forgiveness,
but also his grace that empowers us
to change, to transform.
And it happens,
the very word communion is in community.
And so usually at the end of the service,
in fact, I think every time
at the end of the service,
George or I or whoever's preaching,
Jonathan Camere,
will ask everyone to stand.
I'm not going to do that today.
Sometimes, though,
we do need a physical response,
some way to be able to say,
God, we're not satisfied
with the status quo.
I want to change.
And so I want to ask us all
to stay seated,
and I'm going to join you in it.
I want us to just stay seated
for a second
and just take a moment.
Just take a moment
in the presence of God
and say,
God,
is there any way
at any of these four categories?
The oppression of the poor,
the marginalization of victims,
any of that stuff
is the first category.
The second category is,
is there a sexual sin in our life,
that lust,
or perpetuating abuse,
or anything like that.
The third category
being the breaking of our vows.
And the fourth being
the treating of God
with profanity
as if he's common.
If any one of those,
or all four,
anything like that,
is something that there's
conviction in your heart,
and you want to change,
I want to invite you to stand.
To stand to say,
God, I'm not just,
I'm not satisfied
to hear someone else
talk about this.
I want to change.
I want to join you
in that,
afresh,
in that life of,
of bringing healing
and wholeness
and living life
in light of the gospel.
I want to invite us
in a second
to just stand.
I want to just be quiet,
quietly just pray
on your own,
in your own words,
a prayer of commitment
to the Lord,
and then I'll pray to close.
So,
let me be,
I'll,
yeah,
let's stand
if that's you.
God,
I have sinned against you,
and we have sinned against you.
We have broken your call
to care for the broken.
you've broken
your call
to live a life
of sexual integrity.
We've broken our vows.
We've treated you
as if you're not God,
but just
a common thing.
God,
we're broken.
We're bent out of shape.
We cannot heal ourselves.
I honestly don't know
how to change
some of these things
in my life.
And Lord,
I think that
this is true
for many of us.
But God,
we want to change.
We thank you
that even now,
in the midst
of our brokenness,
in the midst of the reality
of our frailty,
and all of the stuff
that we've done
or not done,
that we come to you
not as
your enemies
or your adversaries,
not even as
abandoned lost children,
but Lord,
we come to you
as your beloved children.
We come to you
as your adopted children.
We thank you
that you love us,
that you have cleansed us
from all our sin.
We thank you
that you have embraced us
as your own.
We thank you
for the gospel.
We thank you
for the death
and resurrection of Jesus
that has made it possible
for us to be in your presence now
and enjoy your goodness.
And we thank you
that you have called us
not just to believe in you
but to live life with you.
And so, Lord,
we're asking you
to help us to change
as individuals,
as families,
and as a church.
God, let us be a church.
Make us a church.
Make us a church
that truly cares
and helps rescue
and gives voice
to the oppressed
and the poor
and the marginalized.
Make us a people
who are walking
in sexual integrity
and freedom
and purity in you.
Make us a people
who are faithful
to our commitments
and make us a people
who are living life
in light of who you are.
You're not common.
God, make us
so fully alive in you.
Lord, we believe
that you can do this
in our midst
and we are committed.
Lord, we're standing
to say we are committed
to you.
So, it's not just that
we're going to promise
ourselves once again
but we're asking you
to be faithful
to your promise
that you will never
leave us nor forsake us
but instead
you'll be with us
to the very end
of the age
and that you
who began a good work
in us
will see it to the end.
To you be all honor
and glory and power.
In Jesus' name,
Amen.